


listening for something more

by CloudCover (RainyForecast)



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Busking, M/M, Meet-Cute, music references
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-06
Updated: 2018-07-06
Packaged: 2019-06-06 03:49:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15186119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RainyForecast/pseuds/CloudCover
Summary: The first time Sid hears the busker in the subway, he’s running uncharacteristically late. He’s bouncing on his heels a little with nervous energy, craning his neck to watch for the next train. And then.Everything in Sid goes quiet as the first perfect note resonates through the station.





	listening for something more

****

 

 

[ **“Méditation” ( from Thaïs), Massenet** ](https://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D7QtGOWemQhY&t=MzY1MzM2ZjhmN2JkYzZjYzZiNmM1NDU5YzQzMzZjNmM2ZDdmM2YxYyxXWVJLMlVyTQ%3D%3D&b=t%3AEq-DaU3xqeeaPB184nfbeA&p=https%3A%2F%2Fknifeshoeoreofight.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F175446816949%2Fm%C3%A9ditation-from-tha%C3%AFs-massenet-the-first)

The first time Sid hears the busker in the subway, he’s running uncharacteristically late. He’s bouncing on his heels a little with nervous energy, craning his neck to watch for the next train. The lack of other people on the platform only serves to make him feel even later and more anxious. And then.

Everything in Sid goes quiet as the first perfect note resonates through the station. He’s never been someone to pay attention to classical music, or street performers for that matter, but the sweet, haunting melody takes hold of him so strongly that his feet feel rooted to the spot.

He turns to look. There’s a man down the platform from him, battered violin case at his feet, the instrument itself tucked under his chin. His eyes are closed and he sways a little with the melody he’s coaxing from his strings. He’s tall, and his huge, careful hands make the violin look delicate and small.

No one is paying him any attention, and Sid can’t fathom how they’re managing it. He can’t look away, and his chest feels tight, like he almost wants to cry. He’s not sure what’s happening, music’s never affected him like this before.

He doesn’t have any cash on him, nothing to give in return for what he’s been given. Instead he stares, and listens, until the man opens dark, warm eyes and smiles at Sid as he continues to play.

Oh.

 

[ **“Story of My Life”, One Direction** ](https://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DT0CN5WAHAyk&t=NTVjZmFjNTU0MTQ4ZDg2ODQxYzQxYjg3MzBjNTVmMjQ1NGViYzZkOSxXWVJLMlVyTQ%3D%3D&b=t%3AEq-DaU3xqeeaPB184nfbeA&p=https%3A%2F%2Fknifeshoeoreofight.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F175446816949%2Fm%C3%A9ditation-from-tha%C3%AFs-massenet-the-first)

Sid puts some smaller bills in his wallet just in case he sees the busker again. He doesn’t, for a couple days. But come Friday morning, there he is. There’s a gaggle of tweens in the matching backpacks of an out-of-state school trip waiting for the train as well, and Sid sees two girls go up to the busker. He’s fiddling with the doohickeys at the top of his instrument but he smiles warmly at them.

“It’s our friend’s birthday?” one of the girls says hesitantly. “I know it’s like, whatever, but do you know any, like… One Direction?” Her thin shoulders hunch a little as if she’s expecting the busker to laugh or blow her off, like Sid suspects a lot of people have done. He half expects the busker to do the same, especially after that classical piece Sid heard him playing before, but he doesn’t.

“Of course!” he says warmly. “My goddaughters love.” He starts to play, and another girl in the huddled group of students swivels around like a bird dog with a scent, expression comically surprised. Her friends laugh and hug her, and they sway and sing along between fits of giggles. The busker watches them with a look of fond indulgence, until he finishes the song with a flourish and the girls applaud him. Sid, for some reason, finds himself smiling from ear to ear. Something about the little tableau is just. It’s nice, is what it is, and it makes him feel happy to be alive.

When the school group has moved on, he walks up to the busker, who’s fiddling with his instrument again.

“That was really nice of you,” Sid says, and drops a five-dollar bill into the man’s open instrument case. The man looks up, and stares for just a moment before breaking into a smile.

“I see you before?” he asks, and Sid feels his face flush.

“I’m here every morning,” he says, and shrugs.

“Have to look for you, then,” the man tells him, and his grin is…almost flirty. “And is nothing, pop song for little girls. People always make fun of what little girls like. So what? Cute song, sweet. Not hard to play, and look how happy they are.”

Sid’s heart is doing some unapproved fluttering about in his chest. “For sure.”

 

**“Baby Mine,” (from Disney’s Dumbo), various**

Sid’s got a cold, and he feels like shit. He woke up feeling morose, lonely, and miserable. He should maybe call in sick, but he has such a hard time justifying it to himself. Is he really that sick? So off to work he goes.

As soon as he makes it down the station steps, he can hear that the busker is back, and something in him feels a little…comforted.

Sure enough, there he is, playing with his typical emotion, a gentle sway with the melody, and that lovely smile of his. There’s a couple standing in front of him, two women holding hands, one of them resting her free hand on the swell of the other’s very pregnant belly. That somehow sparks the recognition in Sid’s brain and he realized that the man is playing the lullaby from Dumbo. The scene in the movie where the baby elephant’s mom sings it to him made Sid cry his eyes out when he’d first seen it as a little kid. He looks at the couple and he listens to the music and he just…aches.

He drops his customary five dollars in the busker’s case when the song is over and the women have left.

“You okay?” the busker asks.

Sid sniffles, a little pathetically. “I’m a little under the weather. That was so beautiful, just now. They looked…so happy.” Oh god, that didn’t come out as yearningly as it sounded in his head, did it?

“Yes,” the busker says. His eyes are so dark and so kind. “But you. Can’t call in sick? Should do. Look really bad.”

“I shouldn’t,” Sid says, but breaks into a hacking coughing fit, and the busker raises a skeptical eyebrow at him. Sid’s shoulders slump. “Okay, maybe I should.”

“Call now,” the busker advices. “Get nice tea from shop on the corner—” he motions upwards. “And go home. Take taxi if is long way.”

“Okay,” Sid says obediently, half wondering why the busker is being so solicitous and half why Sid is listening to his directions.

“My name Evgeni, by the way. Call me Geno” the busker says. “Can blame on me, when call boss.” He grins, tongue caught playfully between his teeth.

“For sure,” Sid says, helpless to do anything but respond to the smile with one of his own. “I’m Sid.

“Nice to meet you, Sid.”

 

**[“Free Fallin’”, Tom Petty](https://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fyoutu.be%2FLISPXhp7pa0%3Ft%3D28s&t=MTlhYzg0NTllMDIyMDM5ZmY1ZDEyMmFjMzI2ZTFlNTRkMWZjMjVkNixXWVJLMlVyTQ%3D%3D&b=t%3AEq-DaU3xqeeaPB184nfbeA&p=https%3A%2F%2Fknifeshoeoreofight.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F175446816949%2Fm%C3%A9ditation-from-tha%C3%AFs-massenet-the-first) **

There’s a homeless man in the station today, curled into a ball in a nest of grimy blankets and cardboard. He’s eyeing Geno suspiciously as he sets out his instrument case. Geno just nods politely at him, and does his usual warm-up of fiddling with his violin’s strings and tuning pegs. 

Sid might have looked violins up on Wikipedia to learn what all the parts were called.

“Hi Sid,” Geno calls out jovilly, before becoming reabsorbed in his instrument.

“Hey,” the homeless man says suddenly to Geno, in a painful cigarette rasp. “You know anything good?”

“Maybe,” Geno replies. “What you like?”

“Tom Petty.”

“Let me see,” Geno says, and digs his phone from his pocket, putting in one earbud and tapping at the screen.

“Mm,” Geno says, after a minute or two of listening with closed eyes. “I like it.” Still listening, he picks up his violin, keeps nodding to the music for a moment or two longer, and starts to play.

Sid recognizes the song, it’s one from his dad’s collection of cassette tapes. He had it out in the garage, a ton of old 70s and 80s music that he’d play while he worked on projects out there.

The homeless man half-hums, half-sings along to the music in a rough, stuttering burr.

Sid slips a twenty in his change cup instead of in Geno’s instrument case.

“I’m give him rest of what I get, if he still here in a few hours,” Geno tells Sid, low.

Sid nods, and leans against the filthy wall to listen, and thinks about being a kid, handing tools to his dad while his dad whistled along to the stereo.

 

[ **“Piano Concerto No. 1,” Tchaikovsky** ](https://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fyoutu.be%2FYya-rNwuxnc&t=ZjUxMGMyNTI0ZTRhMWZmNzRkM2YyNjhiNGIyOGE3YTlhNmY3MWYwNixXWVJLMlVyTQ%3D%3D&b=t%3AEq-DaU3xqeeaPB184nfbeA&p=https%3A%2F%2Fknifeshoeoreofight.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F175446816949%2Fm%C3%A9ditation-from-tha%C3%AFs-massenet-the-first)

It snowed last night, the first of the season, and it always makes Sid feel energized and clean, somehow. He makes his way briskly down the station steps, feeling certain the snow was a good omen and that he’ll see Geno today.

 He’s refusing to think about why exactly he’s so let down on mornings when Geno isn’t there and ecstatic on days he is.

Today, he’s there, but something seems odd. Geno is usually irrepressibly cheerful, but this morning his characteristic smile is missing. He’s playing classical today, and it’s beautiful.

He only plays a few more notes to finish out the phrase when he spots Sid.

“Hi, Sid,” he says, and musters up a faint rendition of his usual grin.

“That was gorgeous,” Sid offers, not sure what to say. They make small talk whenever they meet but even calling them acquaintances is stretching it. He doesn’t know if he should say anything.

“Thank you. Concerto supposed to be for piano, but I’m arrange melody for her,” Geno says, patting his instrument gently. He pauses, like he’s deciding something, then continues. “When I’m miss home, play Russian composers most. This one Tchaikovsky.”

“Sorry you’re homesick,” Sid says, aching for him. “I’m not from as far away, but I do have an idea of how it feels. My family’s in Canada. My sister is nine years younger than me and. Yeah. Miss her like crazy.”

Geno’s eyes are soft. “Yeah. Pretty shit,” he says, startling Sid into a laugh.

Sid doesn’t have anything more to say that would make Geno feel better, so he just takes up his customary place against the wall next to him, hoping the proximity will convey some sort of solidarity.

By the time Sid’s train comes in, Geno looks a little better.

 

[ **“Love Theme, (from Romeo and Juliet), Mancini** ](https://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fyoutu.be%2Fgnu5DNCn_UI%3Ft%3D17s&t=ZWQ2YjNmZWFlMWU5ZmJiY2ExZjgzZGMwYTJmN2Q0YWM0MGIwYmI2NyxXWVJLMlVyTQ%3D%3D&b=t%3AEq-DaU3xqeeaPB184nfbeA&p=https%3A%2F%2Fknifeshoeoreofight.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F175446816949%2Fm%C3%A9ditation-from-tha%C3%AFs-massenet-the-first)

Geno’s music today reminds Sid of the first time he ever heard Geno play. The same unbelievable, aching beauty. Geno’s also…looking at Sid a lot, too. It’s too much, the lush, gorgeous melody and Geno’s searching gaze. Sid feels himself flush, feels his pulse beat in his whole body.

He wants— has wanted— for so long now to do something, say something. Ask Geno if he wants to get coffee. Anything. It’s a little crazy, he knows. He barely knows Geno, doesn’t know if he even likes guys, and if he did, if he’d like Sid…

While Sid’s still at war with himself, his train comes in. Geno starts forward like he’d wanted to say something, but Sid loses his nerve and goes to get in the train, giving Geno a weak smile and a wave as he goes.

 

[ **O Mio Babbino Caro, Giacomo Puccini** ](https://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DDsPXig69g2A&t=OGExNDg5ZjdjNDcxZTZmMzAzNmRjMWZiNGUwMzJhNWMyMzgwOWVjNCxXWVJLMlVyTQ%3D%3D&b=t%3AEq-DaU3xqeeaPB184nfbeA&p=https%3A%2F%2Fknifeshoeoreofight.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F175446816949%2Fm%C3%A9ditation-from-tha%C3%AFs-massenet-the-first)

The nonprofit Sid works for often sends people to gala events in order to network and make advantageous connections. Sid is absolute shit at it, he feels. He’s stiff, his nerves make him come off as bland as unsalted oatmeal. Mario keeps bringing him along anyway, though.

“Well, Sid,” he says with a laugh whenever Sid complains about it. “You’ve got the best poker face on the team. Can’t trust Letang to hold his cool around all the old-money snobs and trust fund babies.” Which, point.

Sid is nursing his champagne and trying to look interested in what the Vander-whatsit across from him is pontificating about, when a smattering of polite applause from the front of the front of the room draws everyone’s attention.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I have a treat for you tonight,” burbles the diamond dripped woman hosting the gala. “As many of you know, world-renowned young violinist Evgeni Malkin has recently begun his term as artist in residence with the New York Philharmonic, to great acclaim. And we’re lucky to have him here tonight, to give us a little taste of what to expect from his tenure. Please join me in welcoming… Evgeni Malkin!”

Geno. Geno is the one striding across the stage, in a tuxedo and tails, giving a casual wave to the assembled glitterati. Geno, bending to speak to the pianist, and smiling charmingly to the audience.

Geno, putting bow to strings and pulling forth a melody, that, while hauntingly beautiful, makes Sid miss the echo and background noise of the subway.

He stays in a state of shock all throughout the piece, until the last note fades and the audience bursts into applause. It would have been cinematic if maybe Geno would have seen him in the crowd, if their eyes had met in recognition, but Sid’s life isn’t a movie and he’s standing too far away from the stage.

He’s in a daze for the rest of the night, to the point that Mario frowns at him and asks him if he’s well. Sid is giving assurances that he’s fine when the hostess swirls up to them in a cloud of bespoke perfume.

“Mr. Lemieux, how wonderful to see you,” she trills. And that’s when Sid notices that she’s got Geno trailing along behind her.

“Have you met Mr. Malkin?” the hostess goes on to say.

Mario shakes his hand, and gestures Sid forward. “Wonderful to meet you, Mr. Malkin, I’ve heard great things. And this is my colleague—”

“Sid!” Geno blurts, eyes wide. “You here!”

Sid’s hand has somehow been scooped up by Geno’s and he’s not even shaking it, just holding on to Sid like Sid might disappear if Geno lets go.

“And you’re here,” Sid manages. “Not in the subway.”

Geno blushes, but doesn’t let go of Sid’s hand. “Ah, yeah. I’m go there for, relax? Remind me of why I’m love music. Play for people who maybe can’t come to classical concert. Try to make them happy. Donate money to charity if anyone give me. Little bit secret.”

“Oh,” is all Sid can say, feeling like he’s drowning in Geno’s dark eyes and warm grip and in the soft, hopeful expression on his face. “That’s amazing, Geno.”

 

[ **“Call Me Maybe”, Carly Rae Jepson** ](https://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DQKTpPyL33Uc&t=OTQzNDNkZDU5NmQxMGRmNzYwMDBiNDFmZWY5ZDdkNzAxNjNjMTZiNCxXWVJLMlVyTQ%3D%3D&b=t%3AEq-DaU3xqeeaPB184nfbeA&p=https%3A%2F%2Fknifeshoeoreofight.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F175446816949%2Fm%C3%A9ditation-from-tha%C3%AFs-massenet-the-first)

“Had such big plans, you know,” Geno says into the curve of Sid’s neck. Sid can feel the way his lips arch into a smile. “Big plans.”

“Oh yeah?” Sid asks, and stretches against his sun-warmed sheets. His gaze catches on the crumpled remains of their evening attire, strewn across Sid’s bedroom floor. “What kind of plans?”

Geno gets up, pressing a kiss to Sid’s forehead. “I’m show you,” he says, and the laughter in his voice makes Sid want to pull him back down and never let go of him. He settles for watching Geno’s glorious ass as he strides from the room.

He returns with his violin in hand. The one Sid has learned is a three-hundred-year-old. multi-million dollar Stradivarius. He puts one knee on the bed and grins devilishly at Sid.

“Special Canadian song, just for you,” he says, and by the time he’s moved from plucking the intro to bowing the first notes of the melody, Sid know exactly what he’s playing.

“Nooo,” Sid groans, and flops back among the pillows. “Please. Why?”

Geno has to stop playing, he’s laughing so hard. “Had to do something! Couldn’t let most beautiful man in New York get away! Was going to give you phone number, ask for date.”

Sid smiles helplessly at him. “Go put that terrifying thing back in its case and come here and kiss me.”

And Geno does.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me as [knifeshoeoreofight](http://knifeshoeoreofight.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr, and as @RainyForecast on Twitter. Come say hi!


End file.
